January 11th

Since Eric’s monumental send-off to 2014 we’ve been taking it easy for a few weeks. You guys, on the other hand, have been set an excellent tone for 2015. So let’s roll up our sleeves and dig into This Week in Videogame Blogging!

Such Mechanic. Very Game.

A veritable games-crit supergroup came together on Twitter to discuss ludo-centrism, or the domination of play in critical discourse. Special thanks to Landon S for capturing the chaos in a storify.

Much like a face drawn from lines, game systems carry assumptions made by their creators. If a man sets out to draw a woman and he idealizes a certain beauty standard, he’s likely to draw women which conform to this beauty standard. If the same man sets out to make an rpg, he’s likely to fabricate a world which systematically expresses these ideas about women as well.

As a part of her argument, Blue explains just how the relationships between systems and context inevitably push ideology to the surface.

Games that employ post-cutscene design ideology tend to be marketed as ‘immersive experiences’ with ‘living, breathing worlds.’ Bioshock Infinite is not a living, breathing world; it is a flashy museum with freaky animatronics.

We don’t have to scorn games (or comics, or YA fiction) to feel a little embarrassed at the prospect of a century with them at the center of the media ecosystem. And on the flip side, we don’t have to discard games (or comics, or YA fiction) to scratch our heads at the wisdom of feeling satisfied by them.

[O]n the one hand it is kind of trivial to focus on video games right now, but the other side of it is — if I want to escape from the real world, I don’t want to escape to a world where no one looks like me, because that tells me that I don’t matter. Because even in a pixel world, I don’t get to exist.

Recent events may have undercut the positivity that has come out of DePass’s work but it’s important to acknowledge efforts like hers.

My issue is that when games attempt to include Jewish characters they often do it so poorly that I end up wishing they hadn’t tried in the first place. Wolfenstein: The New Order is one of the first (possibly the only) game I’ve played that took the time to include a Jewish character and elements of Judiasm as a whole without devolving into lazy, offensive stereotypes, and that’s something that I truly appreciate.

What I love about MOTHER 3 is that the entire package exists as a contradiction. [Creator Shigesato] Itoi’s insistence to use the videogame medium to tell a story that is structured like a play… The insertion of surreal and bizarre humour into serious moments. The fearless reliance of musical motifs or wordless silence to carry the emotional weight of pivotal scenes. The choice of child-like visuals to convey a narrative steeped in adult matters of grief, loss, and the inevitability of change.

The Meyers started off as a humble family, that much is clear. But it seems that they tried to participate in an archetypical narrative which promised them that the future generation, i.e. Kelly and her younger brother Ben, would move up in society, and that attempt is the root cause of all their present problems.

As she explains, the barrier of entry prohibits many gamers from truly understanding poverty, but Three-Fourths Home nonetheless illustrates how the myth of meritocracy traps working class families like the game’s Meyers family more than it helps them.

Forever Fantasy

We have four different authors dissecting four different entries in the Final Fantasy series.

There is something everywhere in a game. There has to be, because someone somewhere spent hours building the form and rules to sustain five seconds of “nothing”. In reality, the Hissing Wastes are full of things to stumble upon, but there is no flag to plant by a statue half-lost to the creeping sands. There’s no quest marker for watching the silhouette of a fox cresting a ridge in front of the imposing milk-white disk of the moon.

[Cullen], not the Inquisitor, is the voice of the player’s memory even if the Inquisitor is the voice of the player’s present and conscience. And he is arguably a solid stand-in romantic hero: the knight-errant, on a Maker-given mission — of atonement, of justice, of victory.

She just didn’t have it and I couldn’t teach it to her. It is something that can only come with practice.

Cara Ellison continues her S.EXE column at Rock, Paper, Shotgun with an in-depth look at 1988’s Romantic Encounters at the Dome. Ellison applauds it as a sex game that actually targets adults, rather than a series of dick jokes, and admires its rough edges that capture a slice of late eighties life:

This is really a man’s fantasy of what a woman wants from a man -– and my mind does these strange backflips. It is probably one of the most interesting sex scenes I’ve played through, apart from Coming Out On Top of course. It’s like being in a man’s head as he tries to fuck you, in an almost cyberpunk manner. It’s slightly neurotic, slightly melancholy. It’s just so weird.

Those looking to write the best passage of 2015, that’s the one to beat.

Dispatches from Vienna

And now, a few words from foreign correspondent Joe Köller on what’s happening in the German games blogosphere:

This happening will provide a deliberate space for you to have fun with the community, and to reflect on the unequal way people of color, and specifically African-American people, are treated by law enforcement. We will support the families of those that were lost by donating to the Eric Garner Fund, and The New York Lawyers Guild that continues to organize protests and bail funds for those imprisoned for exercising their 1st Amendment rights on this matter.

It seems like a great way to build community while supporting a cause.

That’ll Do, Pig. That’ll Do.

As always, it’s been a pleasure to share another week’s worth of videogame blogging with you all. If ever you find something that we ought to feature we happily take requests by email and Twitter!